CHENNAI, INDIA, July 27, 2014 (Telegraph India): Tamil Nadu’s leaders, for all their prickly championing of Tamil culture, let the 1,000th anniversary of the coronation of the greatest Tamil king ever pass without a flutter last week. It was left to a group of writers, historians, retired archaeologists and academics to honour the memory of Rajendra Chola I (960-1044), whose empire stretched from Bengal to India’s southern tip, covered the whole of Sri Lanka and extended up to Indonesia.
A University of Madras professor said the Centre and the Archaeological Survey of India should have led the celebrations. “Rajendra was India’s first global king, not just because of his conquests but also because he opened trade to foreigners and founded a formidable navy that lorded over the Bay of Bengal,” the professor said. “During his time, the Bay came to be called the Chola Lake.”
“(Southeast Asian king) Suryavarman I, with the help of Rajendra, re-established the Khmer kingdom in Cambodia. His successor Suryavarman II built the Angkor Wat, the world’s largest Hindu temple, with the help of artisans sent by Rajendra.” Like his father Raja Raja Chola, who built the grand Shiva temple at Thanjavur, Rajendra too built temples and dug lakes. His greatest architectural feat is the temple at Gangaikondacholapuram, where he had a near-replica of the Thanjavur Big Temple built, but in a smaller version. Both temples are Unesco heritage sites.